The itsy-bitsy spider is getting into too many itchy ears.

Bad Ear Problems

(2 Timothy 4:3-4)

1 I charge you in the presence of God and of Christ Jesus, who is to judge the living and the dead, and by his appearing and his kingdom: 2 preach the word; be ready in season and out of season; reprove, rebuke, and exhort, with complete patience and teaching. 3 For the time is coming when people will not endure sound teaching, but having itching ears they will accumulate for themselves teachers to suit their own passions, 4 and will turn away from listening to the truth and wander off into myths.

3 For the time is coming

In one of the latest books of the Bible, Paul writes here to Timothy about a future time that will come that will have some special challenges. We might light to think that the New Testament era would be a time of unending progress. That is not the case in individual lives, nor in particular churches, or in the church at large. Beyond the ups and downs of life with people in any place and time, Paul is referring to a future period of extreme apostasy as he wrote earlier to the church in Thessalonica. (2 Thes. 2:1-4)

when people will not endure sound (healthy) teaching,

In that future day, people will not put up with healthy teaching. There is teaching that is spiritually healthy for eager souls, but not everyone is eager for it. There remains a witness to the teaching of the whole counsel of God held in orbit by the those doctrines that are of first importance that the Christian church has unanimously confessed now for many centuries. Some people will not endure that kind of healthy word. They want something else.


but having itching ears

If you have itching ears, you may have an itsy bitsy spider in there. If your heart is itching for a different message than that which has been life to the church since the resurrection of Christ, you are asking for a world of hurt. What are people so eager to hear about? Some other method of victory in this life that would be different than the way of the cross. Something more interesting and clever than the presentation of the glory of the only God through the Scriptures. Too bad. There can be all kinds of different styles of faithfully preaching the word, but do we have to put so much honey on the lip of the bitter cup of salvation? (Quoted from memory from Hughes Oliphant Old in Worship)

they will accumulate for themselves teachers to suit their own passions,

There will be teachers ready to accommodate this beast. The people want to satisfy their lusts with some religious teachings. Churches will ordain people who will do the job for them, and the message of Christ, the cross, and the resurrection will seem too stale or old for today's success-seeking Christians.

4 and will turn away from listening to the truth and wander off into myths.

So they will readily leave a place where the Word is being preached faithfully, and go someplace else where their passions for this world can be more readily satisfied. They will turn away from truth. What will they get instead? Myths. Not a good trade. That will not be a healthy diet for the soul that was built by God to feed on the Bread of Life. It breaks my heart, but what can anyone do about it. Just be faithful. Preach it and hear it.